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In the 2000-2001 time frame a lot of us watched in amazement? disgust? at certain dot-com valuations, and Rotary Rocket starved due to lack of funds. It makes

In the 2000-2001 time frame a lot of us watched in amazement? disgust? at certain dot-com valuations, and Rotary Rocket starved due to lack of funds. It makes one wonder about how capital is allocated. People made conscious decisions to invest in a sock puppet versus a technology that gets humans into space.

lerouxb 12y ago
The wikipedia article makes it look like the design was inherently flawed. Entirely possible that venture capital was (at least subjectively) allocated badly AND this project shouldn't have received more funding anyway.
- ansible 12y ago
  An SSTO is an ambitious design in general. That, plus a new engine design, was (in retrospect) too much for a startup company to take on. Just the powered landing system would have been ambitious enough.
  - Already__Taken 12y ago
    If there's ever some kind of standard that emerges for rockets maybe a company like this can make an interim payload stage to add to recover the vehicle. Like how satellites are gaining more and more standard parts and form factors. As presently any system like that I assume is pretty must bespoke per rocket family.
    - ansible 12y ago
      As presently any system like that I assume is pretty must bespoke per rocket family. Yeah, but the original engine was not the standard LOX/kero turbopump affair. The seals were breaking new ground, if nothing else.
BerislavLopac 12y ago
I don't get why is that so baffling -- the whole premise of VC is to invest in projects that offer a high return in a short period of time, at the cost of the high risk that they will fail. That risk is offset by a large volume of similar investments, meaning that low-cost opportunities are much more interesting. Hardware and energy intensive technologies -- like rockets, satellites and the like -- definitely fail at both the time and cost criteria (and their risk rate is not quite among the lowest). That means that they'll get invested in only by entities which are capable (and willing) of investing large amounts for long periods of time, while willing to accepts significant risk -- which reduces the group to governments, large companies like Google and determined individuals like Musk and Branson. So, capital is allocated considering a number of criteria, the perceived risk being among the most important. The key word here is _perceived_, as in the late nineties a lot of investors started believing in the myth of endless growth, which significantly lowered the risk they perceived on sock puppets and the like.

lerouxb 12y ago

The wikipedia article makes it look like the design was inherently flawed. Entirely possible that venture capital was (at least subjectively) allocated badly AND this project shouldn't have received more funding anyway.

ansible 12y ago
An SSTO is an ambitious design in general. That, plus a new engine design, was (in retrospect) too much for a startup company to take on. Just the powered landing system would have been ambitious enough.
- Already__Taken 12y ago
  If there's ever some kind of standard that emerges for rockets maybe a company like this can make an interim payload stage to add to recover the vehicle. Like how satellites are gaining more and more standard parts and form factors. As presently any system like that I assume is pretty must bespoke per rocket family.
  - ansible 12y ago
    As presently any system like that I assume is pretty must bespoke per rocket family. Yeah, but the original engine was not the standard LOX/kero turbopump affair. The seals were breaking new ground, if nothing else.

BerislavLopac 12y ago

I don't get why is that so baffling -- the whole premise of VC is to invest in projects that offer a high return in a short period of time, at the cost of the high risk that they will fail. That risk is offset by a large volume of similar investments, meaning that low-cost opportunities are much more interesting. Hardware and energy intensive technologies -- like rockets, satellites and the like -- definitely fail at both the time and cost criteria (and their risk rate is not quite among the lowest). That means that they'll get invested in only by entities which are capable (and willing) of investing large amounts for long periods of time, while willing to accepts significant risk -- which reduces the group to governments, large companies like Google and determined individuals like Musk and Branson. So, capital is allocated considering a number of criteria, the perceived risk being among the most important. The key word here is _perceived_, as in the late nineties a lot of investors started believing in the myth of endless growth, which significantly lowered the risk they perceived on sock puppets and the like.